1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a software application and a method for scanning documents with a scan system. More specifically, an application and a method of arrangement of image files generated by a plurality of scanners that scan documents simultaneously are disclosed.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A scanner involves many fields such as optics, machinery, electronics, and software algorithms. Its main job is transforming physical image information into digital images files. The transformation process comprises selecting an original object (or document) to scan, transforming analog signals into digital signals, and performing software algorithms, each of these processes being connected with the others. While scanning numerous documents, in addition to scanning precision with respect to color, a most important factor is scan speed. However, conventional scanners are limited by mechanical structure, software algorithm speed, and electronic and optical mechanisms and thus have limited scan speeds.
Please refer to FIG. 1. FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of a conventional scan system 10. The scan system 10 comprises a host computer 12, a bus 14, a plurality of scan codes 16, and a plurality of scanners 18. The scanners 18 connect with the host 12 via the bus 14. The bus 14 is a universal serial bus (USB), a firewire (IEEE 1394), an Ethernet cable, or a small computer system interface (SCSI). Each scan code 16 is used to process algorithms and coordinate file arrangement after the corresponding scanner 18 scans a document and generates document image files. Even though the host computer 12 can simultaneously electrically connect to the plurality of scanners 18, each scan code 16 still processes one image file from one scanner 18 at a time. If a user wants to operate the plurality of scanners 18 simultaneously, the user has to open the plurality of scan codes 16 in the host computer 12. In this way, the method results in a heavy burden on the host computer 12 and user inconvenience for manipulating windows successively to oversee all the scan jobs. More specifically, after scanning, the user has to clearly record each job corresponding to each scanner to avoid incorrect arrangement of scattered image files. This is obviously quite inefficient.
If a user wants to purchase a ten-times-faster scanner, the cost will be more than, ten times that of a typical scanner. If a user wants to generate ten-times the scans with ten identical scanners connected to parallel, according to the prior art, no software is capable of controlling the plurality of scanners to operate simultaneously and to automatically return the scattered image files to an initial arrangement. The user has to open the plurality of scan codes 16 and manually arrange the image files. This method is inefficient and prone to mistakes.
The U.S. Pat. No. 6,122,684 discloses a scan system connected to a network. A plurality of scanners connects with computers and to each other through the network, and a single computer can control the plurality of scanners to scan to promote a speed suitable for mass scanning of documents. However, the scanners connected via the network are very expensive and bandwidth of the network being limited by hardware and data flow results in a bottleneck of data transmission. Moreover, controlling operation of the scanners via network protocol requires more complicated procedures, and is thus more complicated than via IEEE 1394, USB, and SCSI interfaces.
The Taiwan Patent No. 458454 discloses an expansible scanner system. Based on the patent, a plurality of platform scanners are connected in parallel via a transmission interface resulting in a bottleneck of data transmission. Furthermore, the patent also does not disclose any method of arranging files generated by the scanners resulting in inconvenience for users.